Sometimes photo plans don’t work out. I’d planned this shoot with Melissa to be outdoors on a nice late summer afternoon. In the mountains though late summer brings the threat of storms and we prepared to go shoot, the weather to the west was quite ominous. A quick check of the radar on my phone showed several lines of rain and storms coming in toward town. So we went to a plan B, shooting some light painting indoors.
I like the first one here as part of a set we did. The idea is a mix of a couple of ideas, but the strongest is probably the horror movie cliché of the old asylum. The sepia toning I think adds to the older feel of looking at something from the past. The story here is one of questions. The slight out of focus to give it a feel of being a little off normal. Is she someone trapped and trying to get out to the viewer for escape or is she trying to get out to ensnare the viewer? Is the hand restraining her trying to keep her in to protect the viewer, or keep her from being helped by the viewer? Melissa nailed the expression perfectly here, a mix of desperation, fear, and hope.
Some others around the same theme, but more directly something menacing than the first photo. Here there’s no doubt of the intent and I think the starkness of the lighting highlights that. Love her expression in the first of these too. It really conveys the the emotion wonderfully.
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